Murder in the Forum

Chapter Twenty-three

Junio was waiting for me. Wine was on offer at the inn, but he had obtained from somewhere a flagon of honeyed mead and a handful of spices, and was in the process of heating them up in a borrowed pan over the communal fire, preparing my favourite drink.

‘Where did you get this from, you young scoundrel?’ I asked, taking the proffered drinking vessel with real relish and pretended severity. In fact, knowing Junio, I guessed that he had probably won them from some unsuspecting player of twelve stones.

Junio grinned. ‘There is a tax-collector newly arrived in the mansio from Glevum, with his slave. The others in the inn have kept away from him’ — I nodded, tax-collectors are generally as popular as lepers — ‘but I am not too proud to play a game of dice with his servant. Especially as he had a flagon of mead about him. I know your preferences, master. And there was little risk — they were his dice.’

I smiled, indulgently. Gambling in inns is technically forbidden, except on public feast-days, but provided there is no fighting over stakes the law is rarely enforced — one might as well attempt to stamp out an ants’ nest with a pin. ‘I see the Fates have favoured you again.’ I poured out a little of my mead in front of the hearth. ‘There, I have given the gods an oblation in gratitude.’

I was jesting, but there was method in my action. I am not a superstitious man, but my dealings with Zetso had frightened me severely. And it had distressed me to fail. I felt some sort of offering was necessary.

Junio knew me. ‘You let him go then, master?’

I sighed. ‘I had no option, really.’ I knew what Junio was waiting for, and (as is my custom on these occasions) I told him all about it, word for word as nearly as I could remember. Merely telling him is sometimes enough to give me insights, and he will occasionally notice details which I had missed.

He did so now.

‘Killers.’ He interrupted my recital. ‘Why should Zetso think of killers? In the plural? That is suggestive, don’t you think?’

I forced myself to smile. I have tried to teach Junio my trade, and I should be pleased when he is more observant than I am.

‘He talked of earlier plots, in Rome,’ I answered feebly. My pleasure at my servant’s skill does not necessarily entail drawing his attention to my own lack of it.

Junio grinned. ‘I am not surprised. Felix must have made many enemies. He had not been in Glevum above a day, and already I can think of people who would cheerfully have killed him.’

I sipped at my mead. ‘But who would have dared? Or had the means and opportunity?’

‘You think Zetso killed him? If Phyllidia could steal poison from her father, presumably his slaves could do the same. Or perhaps Zetso plotted with others, and his fellow conspirators struck sooner than he expected? That would explain both his surprise and his remarks.’

‘It is possible,’ I said. ‘He has the mentality for it. I saw his face when he recalled the herald. I think Zetso enjoys killing.’

‘Then he found himself the right master,’ Junio said.

I nodded. I might have said more, but at that moment the door opened and a short, thin, self-important man in a vulgar vermilion-dyed tunic and voluminous cloak looked in. He glanced at my dishevelled tunic with a mixture of disdain and astonishment, said, ‘Good evening, countryman,’ in an affected, but imitation, Roman accent and disappeared again. I didn’t need to be a rune-reader to recognise the tax-collector.

‘There goes the most hated man in all Britannia,’ I said, raising my drinking cup again. ‘Now that Perennis Felix is dead, that is!’ The mead tasted all the sweeter now that I had seen its rightful owner. It is rare that tax-collectors find themselves on the receiving end of improper extortion.

Junio refilled my goblet, with a grin. ‘I thought your Celtic friend with the damaged finger was your favourite contender for the title?’ My slave was doing his utmost to lift my mood.

I was ungracious. ‘Ah yes,’ I said. ‘Egobarbus. Another unsolved mystery.’

‘Do you suppose that Zetso murdered him?’

I sighed. Even my spiced mead could not console me on this one. ‘I would have sworn he did it,’ I said. ‘That would explain the poison bottle in the ditch. But Zetso himself does not believe that he did. That was obvious from his manner.’

Junio shrugged. ‘If you are right, he brought poison. You hardly murder a man in that fashion without knowing it.’

‘He did not push that body down the well — the house-owner was watching him. Nor did he return to do it later. He clearly has witnesses that he returned to the villa that night.’

‘Suppose that Felix had Egobarbus murdered because he owed him money,’ Junio said. ‘If he will kill a herald for bringing bad news he would do no less to escape a serious debt. Could it have been a plot, to substitute one Egobarbus for another?’

‘I had thought of that,’ I said. ‘But how, in that case, did he silence the slaves? They were not bribed. They had scarcely an as between them when they came to pay the coach-driver. And that was no pretence, they were almost imprisoned for it.’

‘Perhaps Felix promised to give them what he owed to Egobarbus,’ Junio suggested. ‘After all, they appealed to him from the jail.’

‘In that case, why murder Egobarbus at all? Felix would still have to pay. He could not hope to cheat the slaves, if they knew where the body was. And why invite them to the feast where everyone could see them? It makes no sense.’

‘Nothing in this mansio makes sense,’ the high-pitched, affected voice broke in from the doorway.

I glanced at Junio. Our tax-collector was back.

‘All I require is a roasted fowl and a goblet of decent wine,’ the newcomer went on, approaching the fire. I saw to my alarm that he was carrying a wooden gaming box. ‘And all they can offer me is some frightful Gallic vintage and a dish of some revolting local stew.’ He settled himself on a seat not far from me, and placed the box conspicuously in front of him. The laws on gambling do not extend to board games. Clearly, despite my dishevelled appearance, I was to be tolerated as a gaming partner. ‘I hear you are a Roman citizen, after all. Do you play?’

I don’t, if I can help it. I am not like Junio, and I am as likely to lose a gamble as to win it. But there was little I could do. It was too late to travel further that day, and clearly we were to spend the evening together. To refuse would be discourteous.

I do not care for tax-collectors, but since I am a citizen, and therefore liable to tax, I am generally careful not to offend them. If there is a shortfall in collection, as there often is, I prefer not to be an individual target for additional levies. Besides, he had not waited for an answer: asking the average Roman if he gambles is tantamount to asking if he breathes. The man was already laying out the inlaid board and counting out the coloured glass tiles into two heaps.

‘I should have stayed in Glevum,’ he grumbled conversationally. ‘At least I should have been assured of a clean bed and a respectable meal. But one might as well try to catch the clouds as attempt to collect any taxes there at present. What shall we play for, citizen?’

I had been afraid of this. After the expenses of the day I had little money with me. I placed a few brass coins on the table. ‘This, to begin?’ I knew that it was hopeless. The board itself was worth more than I possessed.

He glanced at Junio, and for a moment I thought that he was about to suggest the slave as a stake. In that case, offended or not, I would have been obliged to refuse him.

But I was safe. ‘That flagon of mead, perhaps, against another? I have acquired one, though I rarely drink it. I can sell it in Eboracum. At least there I shall be away from that confounded funeral.’ He placed his first playing piece on the board, and waited for me to place mine. Behind him, Junio had caught my eye and was signalling numbers with his fingers.

‘The funeral?’ I supplied, helpfully. Junio had signalled three, four, and I held my piece speculatively over the fourth square on the third rank. Junio shook his head. I moved it to the third square on the fourth rank and Junio smiled. I placed the piece. ‘I imagine there are lavish preparations.’

‘Wreaths and statues and Jupiter knows what,’ the tax-collector said, pausing only as we laid out our tiles one by one. ‘They are talking of having the whole garrison marching in procession. Gladiatorial games and spectacles in the arena. . all funded from the public purse. And you know what that will mean, don’t you, citizen? More taxes, more trouble, more travelling for me. Why the governor has to come at all I cannot see. They could hold the funeral perfectly well without him.’

‘The governor?’ The board was almost complete by now, and I paused with my last piece in my hand. ‘Helvius Pertinax is coming to Glevum? In person?’ Under Junio’s discreet instruction, I laid down my counter. It was, appropriately enough, the dux — the high-ranking piece, like Helvius Pertinax himself. Marcus’s patron and friend was no more than a name to me, but I could well understand what a stir his arrival in the colonia would produce.

The taxman moved one of his coloured counters to jump one of mine. ‘Of course,’ he said, importantly, whisking my tile from the board. ‘This Perennis Felix was a powerful man. An intimate of the Emperor, it is said.’ He moved again; another of my tiles disappeared. ‘Of course, messengers were dispatched to the Governor at once, riding night and day, and they returned yesterday with the information.’ A third tile was taken from the board, and I glanced at Junio. He winked reassuringly.

It was my move now, and taking my cue from my slave I moved my dux into an open space. It looked feeble after our beginning, and the tax-man grinned hugely. He moved one of his own pieces forward to attack. ‘As soon as Pertinax received the news he set out towards Glevum with all speed. He is already on his way.’

Suddenly I saw what Junio had planned. ‘They will delay the funeral till he arrives?’ I said, and suddenly it was all over. One by one his pieces fell to mine, and I was left triumphant with more than half my tiles untouched. ‘My win, I think, my friend,’ I said. ‘A lucky chance. I think you said a flagon of mead?’ Next time I took Junio to the market, I thought, I would buy him a dozen honey-cakes if he chose, and I apologised mentally for having doubted his skill.

The tax-collector was glowering. He clapped his hands impatiently and a skinny slave appeared. The tax-collector gave his orders in an undertone, and the slave, with a reproachful glance at Junio and the pot of mead which was now bubbling aromatically on the hearth, murmured something back and disappeared again. The taxman cleared his throat.

‘It will have to be coins after all,’ he mumbled. ‘Our mead has apparently been stolen while we sat here, by a bunch of unscrupulous villains with cudgels.’ He looked at our flagon suspiciously, but Junio gave him the most innocent of smiles.

I could not repress a grin myself, but I saw an opportunity to ingratiate myself. It is not always expedient to win a game of chance.

‘Have a little of our mead in any case? My slave has made it hot and spiced, in the Celtic fashion. I warrant you will find it excellent.’

He hesitated for a moment, but temptation was too strong. He accepted the brimming cup which Junio offered him and, rather unwisely, drained it at a gulp. He was not used to mead, which can be potent when warmed, so I won the second game quite easily, even without Junio’s help. And the third. It did not matter. In a very short space of time our companion had become quite remarkably confiding and garrulous.

‘It’s my belief,’ he assured us, rather indistinctly, ‘that Pertinax is only coming to Glevum because that fellow Marcus has got married. He is threatening an enormous feast as soon as this funeral is over.’ He pondered over a move. ‘An attractive widow, so they say, and already ruling him like a general. Ah! My game, I think.’

I had with some difficulty managed to place my dux where he could not fail to take it. It was important that he win something. Tomorrow, when he was sober, he might regret his losses and I would still be liable for tax.

‘They say,’ the taxman said, reaching out for the coins on the table and sweeping them with one unsteady hand in the general direction of the other. The affected Roman accent was slurred with drink and it was with difficulty that I made out what he was saying. ‘They say,’ he lifted a drunken finger at me, ‘she is sulking. . over some slaves of hers who were killed and refuses to leave Glevum until the murderer is found. Though Marcus,’ he smiled a stupidly beatific smile, ‘has somebody in cust. . cust. . has somebody locked up. Stupid fellow confessed. Silly sort of chap from Rome.’

Octavius, I guessed, and blessed whichever gods were responsible for that particular false rumour. I might have asked the taxman more, but he was already slumping forward on his stool, and leaning his head upon the table. Four or five beakers of hot mead had taken their toll. I made a mental resolution to leave the building next morning before the headache awoke.

I tiptoed off with some relief and availed myself of the bath-house. It was small, but adequate, and the sensation of hot steam and cool water — to say nothing of a quick oil and scrape-down from the bath-house slave — made me feel more human than I had done for several days. If I had only had a clean tunic to put on, I would have felt almost myself again. This one was becoming as battered and travel-weary as I was.

We returned to the communal eating room, where a cheerful stew was being served, and I made a comfortable meal. Junio, in the servants’ quarters, ate more simply, but quite well. The tax-collector had disappeared, though the sound of reverberating snores from one of the sleeping rooms suggested what direction he had taken.

After dinner I had a short discussion with the octio. He offered his contingent as escort for our carriage as far as Letocetum.

I was tempted. I knew that Egobarbus had been at Letocetum and Marcus had sent me (hadn’t he?) to investigate the death. Even if I took his carriage, I wouldn’t be exceeding my authority — much — and if I achieved results my patron would forgive me. Indeed, he would be likely to claim that it was all his own idea. However, I could not be in two places at once. I still had to deliver Zetso’s letter to the ex-centurion, and that would answer the question of where Felix spent the night. Regretfully, I was obliged to decline.

‘You were lucky tonight, master,’ Junio said with a grin, as he assisted me, still dressed in my tunic, to the floor.

‘On the contrary,’ I said testily. ‘I have failed. I have not solved the question of Egobarbus, and now Zetso has slipped through our fingers. But what could I do? Zetso was carrying an imperial warrant, and without evidence it is more than my life is worth to detain him. But it is a tiresome business. I should not have let him go. I am still convinced that he was involved in the death of Egobarbus.’

Junio looked at me. ‘It would be possible, master, for you to accept the octio’s offer. You could accompany the soldiers, perhaps in one of their carts, and I could take the carriage and deliver the letter. You could seek out Zetso and we could meet tomorrow evening in Letocetum.’

There was some sense in the suggestion, but I shook my head. ‘I do not trust him a thumbs breadth. For all I know this letter carries instructions to throw me in irons as soon as I arrive.’

‘But it will name you, it will not apply to me,’ Junio said. ‘And even if it does, better he imprisons me than you. You could go to Marcus — or even Pertinax — and sue for my release. It would be much more difficult to do the same for you. They would take days to grant me an audience. And I will have Marcus’s carriage-driver with me.’

‘Oh, very well,’ I said reluctantly. ‘I will think about it.’ I lay down on the straw and put the tablet under the pillow at my head. I had been clinging to it all evening like a nervous sailor clinging to a oar. ‘All the same, I wish I knew what that letter said.’

Junio finished arranging blankets over me. ‘You should get some sleep, master. You will have to rise very early to avoid the tax-collector. He might want another game with you, and you would never beat him, sober. At least, not without me.’

He gave me a cheeky smile, and blew out the candle and curled up at my feet. I wanted to think of a reply, but it had been a long day and he was already asleep. I lay a long time on the straw, the events of the last few days swirling through my brain like unconnected pattern pieces for a pavement. Then I too, drifted into sleep.