Requiem for a Slave

Twelve

It took us a little time to reach them even then, and what a reception I received when we arrived! I might have been a hero returning from the wars, the way that Junio and Maximus behaved. They dropped the handcart as quickly as they could, grinning like a pair of idiots, and hastened over — my son to clap my shoulder heartily and the slave to fall on one knee and kiss my hand. But my wife seemed less delighted to find me safe and well. She shouldered past the pair of them, and — far from giving me a fond embrace — pummelled against my chest with both her fists.

‘Libertus! Husband! How could you worry me so much! First I thought that you were dead, and then you were missing-’ She broke off, and I recognized that she was in tears and this was the anger of extreme relief.

I captured both her hands and held her tight. ‘It’s all right, Gwellia,’ I murmured in her ear and felt her sobbing cease. Then, in a complete reversal of her mood, she collapsed upon my neck and — in full view of the servants — hugged and kissed me tenderly.

In the end, I had to extricate myself and say with what dignity I could muster, ‘I am glad to see you too. It has been a worrying day.’ I was on the point of telling her that we’d lost Minimus, but decided that this unhappy news could wait. For one thing, I was not certain that I wasn’t being overheard by unseen listeners behind me in the wood, and I did not want my wife’s distress to give any satisfaction to the kidnappers. So, instead, I went on in a normal tone, ‘But we should not linger out here on the lane. I’ve come to lend a hand. Give me that lamb you’ve got there on the handcart, Maximus: that will lighten the load for you and balance it as well.’ I gestured towards the unattended cart which showed an increasing tendency to topple to the right.

Maximus obeyed, though he struggled under the dead weight of the animal. It was a big lamb and bulky, though the fleece had been removed — there was always a separate market for sheepskin in the town — and he is small and slight, despite his name. But he contrived to help me drape it round my neck, so that I was carrying it on my shoulders as the shepherds do. The sheep was surprisingly heavy — I have felt a new respect for shepherds ever since, though the creature was stiff and perhaps more difficult to manage than a living animal. When I had it balanced, I gestured to the slave to hand me back my makeshift staff, which I had dropped on to the ground when Gwellia ran at me.

Meanwhile, the others had begun to rearrange the cart, which was still piled high with purchases for Amato’s naming day. It was an awkward load: metal trinkets from the silversmiths, the whole family’s garments from the fuller’s shop where they’d been newly cleaned (everyone is expected to wear white at a Roman naming day) and incense for the shrine. There were leather bags and wooden boxes full of foodstuffs too: special sweet cakes from the baker’s shop as well as dates and figs and every kind of fruit. There was also a small amphora full of wine, another one of oil, and even a cage of white doves for the cleansing sacrifice, which had been balanced precariously on the top of all of this — no wonder Junio had wanted an extra steadying hand.

However, with the heavy carcass now removed, the rest was soon arranged and roped securely into place. Junio and Maximus between them pushed the cart and, with Kurso carrying the doves, and Gwellia the torch, our little procession set off in the direction I had come — back towards the roundhouses again.

Only then did I outline the happenings of the day. I kept it very brief and did not mention Minimus at all. The corpse that they’d heard about was the pie-seller, I explained. When the tanner saw me, I was on my way to Lucius’s mother to tell her the news, and then I’d hurried over to put Pedronius’s pavement down. ‘I didn’t want to lose the Apollo contract too,’ I finished. ‘And then I found a gig to drive me home from there, so we didn’t pass through the gates.’

‘So that’s why we didn’t find you in the shop,’ Junio exclaimed. ‘And why no one had seen you at the gates. I did think to enquire.’ He looked at me for approval. I had trained him in my methods while he was my slave. ‘I was expecting that you would catch up with us. I wondered why you hadn’t, even if you left Glevum a long time after us. This is the way you usually come and, as you can see, we were not moving fast.’

They would have been slower still without a light, I thought, using my staff to help me as I picked my way among the muddy potholes and roots along the lane. But all I said was, ‘You must have been alarmed, especially after that peculiar message saying I was hurt.’ Then, suddenly conscious of the distant wolves again, I added, ‘Gwellia, tell me about this mysterious messenger.’

She had nothing to add that I’d not already heard from Kurso, in fact, but I heard her out, knowing that she would be comforted by simply voicing it and also distracted from the terrors of the night.

Junio looked across at me and caught my eye. As usual, he had understood my ploy and he took up the tale as soon as she had stopped — though he had very little to report. He had spent the day exactly as he’d planned, making his purchases, collecting the clean clothes and paying a visit to the local priest of Mars, who was to perform tomorrow’s ritual. ‘The pontifex made it very clear to me,’ he added wryly, ‘that he was not coming out of duty — he would not normally come out all this way — but simply because he was “a friend of Marcus’s”. No doubt he hopes to be rewarded when your patron returns.’

‘Then I hope he isn’t disappointed,’ I remarked. ‘Marcus is famously careful with his wealth.’

‘He’s promised to officiate in any case,’ my son replied, ‘and to make the preliminary sacrifice for cleansing Cilla and the roundhouse from the impurities of birth. He doesn’t even want a fee, he says — though he does want you to make a point of telling His Excellence all this. By the way, he says there’s been a messenger and Marcus is already on his way. The letter came to the curia today, apparently.’

I was about to say that I had heard as much from Quintus earlier when Gwellia put in unexpectedly, ‘And to the villa too. One of the servants came to the roundhouse shortly after noon, in great excitement, to tell us the news. The travellers are expected back here in a day or so — though not in time for the bulla feast, of course. But Marcus has sent a gift ahead of him in honour of the day — a beautiful silver trinket for little Amato.’

‘That was very generous of my patron,’ I said, privately suspecting that his wife had organized that piece of thoughtfulness. Marcus is not given to expensive gifts and I had not expected him to send a present for the naming day, even if he knew that it was happening.

He might well not have known. I had written every moon, as he had requested, to keep him informed of what was happening in the town, and obviously in my last I had told him of the birth. However, such letters took a long time to arrive, and since, as Cilla had remarked, the bulla day is traditionally held only nine days after a boy is safely born, I could not be certain that Marcus had received the message yet. I had sent an invitation for him to the villa, naturally — since he was my patron it would have been an insult to do otherwise, even if he was not in residence — but I had hardly expected such a generous response.

So I was more than a little startled when Gwellia said, ‘They are going to send someone to attend on his behalf, though the servant that I spoke to did not know who it was. Marcus suggested it himself apparently, since he cannot be here in person.’

I was surprised and said so.

Gwellia shook her head. ‘It is the sort of thing that Marcus sometimes does — he’s sent you to represent him at a social function before now.’

‘But I am a citizen, and that is different,’ I protested. ‘Marcus has had the villa closed up while he is away and there are only servants there — no one of any proper status as a representative.’ Not that I had any objection to welcoming a slave — after all, I had once been captured into slavery myself — but Marcus would have felt the impropriety of a low-born substitute.

Gwella smiled. ‘So he’ll send the most senior person in the household, I suppose — the chief slave himself, I shouldn’t be surprised. That would be quite fitting really, since Cilla was a maidservant at the villa once. It would be awkward for Marcus to be here as her guest. I know that you and Junio are the official hosts — you as the head of the family, and Junio as the child’s father — but Cilla will be present and the roundhouse is her home. And a very humble one he thinks it, I’ve no doubt. So he’d feel that a high-ranking servant is a perfectly appropriate emissary.’

She was right, of course, but I said stubbornly, ‘Marcus was the magistrate who invited her to dine, and thus enabled me to set her free. And she is a Roman citizen by marriage now, so there can no impropriety in her inviting him. As to it being a humble roundhouse, why should he object? Ours is very similar and he has been there several times.’

Gwellia tucked a hand into the arm that held the lamb in place over my shoulder and said gently, ‘Only when you were ill and could not go to him. Besides, you have invited local farmers to come and join the feast — they may be freemen, but they are not the class of people that Marcus mixes with. And there’s another thing. If your patron were to come in person, he would naturally take precedence in everything, instead of you. So this is quite a clever solution on his part, isn’t it? He attends by proxy and there is no offence — and no embarrassment on either side. And Amato will have a lovely gift to show for it.’

She was right again. I could think of no intelligent reply, so I changed the subject to arrangements for tomorrow’s little feast, and we talked of other matters for a while. It was still dark and chilly, but the wind had died and the forest seemed less threatening now there were more of us — even the wolves had ceased their howling now. After a little we passed the pile of branches by the track, and, as the faint smell of woodsmoke and burnt charcoal reached us on the breeze, I realized that we were getting close to home.

Before I could say so, Maximus piped up, as though he read my thoughts, ‘That must be the roundhouse. I can see a glow. And there’s someone standing by the door. I can see the dark outline. I’ll bet it’s Minimus.’ His face was radiant with a sudden joy, and I remembered how close the two of them had been — so close, in fact, that when I knew them first, they used to finish each other’s sentences.

That recollection clenched cold hands round my heart. I said, as gently as I could, ‘I don’t believe so. I’m afraid I have disturbing news for you — something I haven’t told you which occurred today. I will tell you all about it when we get back to the house.’ I was still reluctant to discuss this where we might be heard.

But Maximus seemed to sense that something was amiss. He dropped the handle of the cart and came around to face me in the middle of the path. I thought for a minute that he was confronting me, but he was too well-trained a slave to do anything like that. He only bowed his head and murmured brokenly, ‘Something has happened to Minimus, master? Is that what you mean? Has there been an accident? Is he hurt?’ He searched my face with anxious eyes, before he said, ‘Or dead?’

I shook my head. ‘I really do not know. I hope not, but I don’t want to talk about this out here in the lane. We’ll get back to the roundhouse and unload these things, and then I’ll tell you everything I can.’ But he didn’t move, and I had to speak severely before he reluctantly obeyed and went back to his position helping with the cart.

The others had been listening to all this, of course, and a strange unhappy silence settled on the group as we struggled on along the lane towards the house. Those last hundred paces seemed to take a year, but at last our small procession reached the roundhouse door. The smell of smoke was much stronger now, and I could see that in our absence Cilla had got the fire-pit ready for the lamb.

The cooking-pit had been sited a little to the back, which is why I had not noticed it when I arrived before, and my first action now was to go and look at it. The fiery embers had been raked aside and the stones which lined the pit were glowing red, bathing the scene in an unearthly light. I signalled to Kurso to toss in a layer of damp straw, which had been left ready in a nearby pile, then — with a grunt of relief — I dropped the heavy lamb into the hole. In the torchlight, we gathered aromatic leaves to sprinkle over it, added another layer of the straw and finally enough fresh earth to seal the pit. The animal would cook quite slowly in the heat, but by the feast next morning it should be ready to consume. Already it reminded me of feast days in my youth.

I brushed the loose dust from the fire-pit from my hands and went indoors with little Kurso still trotting at my heels. The others had unpacked the handcart by this time — the contents were stacked around the roundhouse on all sides and Junio and Gwellia were consuming stew beside the fire, while Maximus was waiting with the water jug to serve them as they ate. Two smaller bowls, clearly for himself and Kurso, were standing on the bench.

Cilla was presiding at the cooking-pot, where there was still a pleasing quantity of hot and fragrant stew. She saw us enter and waved the ladle cheerfully at me. ‘You have set the lamb to cook, then?’

I nodded. ‘With Kurso’s help. He has deserved his meal. And Maximus too, I think.’

But the red-haired pageboy did not rush to eat. He stood like a statue with the water jug. ‘Master, you promised. . the news of Minimus? I see he is not here.’

I took a deep breath. ‘Minimus has gone — I don’t know where or when. He simply disappeared when I had left the shop this afternoon — about the same time as Lucius was killed. I fear he has been kidnapped by the murderers and, worse, they may be taking him somewhere to be sold.’ I didn’t mention rebels — that was too terrible a possibility to share. ‘I had been hoping to receive a ransom note for him, but I haven’t had one.’

Maximus had turned a deathly shade of white. ‘So he may be dead! If he saw the murder, perhaps he was killed too — just to make sure he couldn’t tell.’

It was Junio who answered. ‘But your master doesn’t think so, and I think I can see why: because, in that case, surely we would have found the corpse. There would be no sense in hiding it, when Lucius’s body was left for us to see. Is that not so, Father?’

‘Exactly,’ I replied. Junio had put it bluntly — for Maximus’s sake I might have avoided talking about Minimus’s ‘corpse’ — but, in fact, that was precisely how I had reasoned things. ‘So there is every chance that he is still alive.’ Though if the rebels had him, I thought, he might wish that he were not.

Minimus, however, looked a little comforted. ‘But surely someone must have seen him taken from the shop. If we knew at least which way they went, we could try to get him back.’

I shook my head. ‘I can’t find anyone who witnessed where he went, not even the tanner — although I’ve asked, of course. But I can’t believe that he went willingly — I left him in charge of the workshop while I was away — so I am still inclined to think that he’s been carried off, most likely by the murderer himself.’ I didn’t add the obvious: that he might have been knocked unconscious and stuffed into a sack, to make it easier and less conspicuous to drag him away.

Gwellia had obviously worked this out herself. ‘But he would have no value if he’s damaged very much,’ she said softly. ‘I suppose that is some comfort. Poor little Minimus. But there is nothing else that we can do tonight?’

I shook my head. ‘I don’t believe so. After the bulla ritual, I will go straight back to town and make as many enquiries as I can. I’ll go to all the gates. Someone, somewhere, must have noticed him — or something which will put us on the track.’

‘And I will come with you,’ Junio put in. ‘Two people asking questions will save a lot of time, and the sooner we have news, the sooner we can act. But, in the meantime, there is a feast day to prepare.’

Gwellia nodded briskly. ‘There is a lot to do. Maximus, eat your supper and then come back with me and help to set the bread and cakes to rise before you go to bed. Then, first thing in the morning, you can go and cut some reeds, and Kurso can gather some sweet-smelling herbs that you can put with them. Then both report to me. We’ll come up here and strew them on this roundhouse floor, as soon as Cilla’s swept it for the day, so that it smells delightful by the time the high priest comes. He’ll be fairly early because he’ll want to make sure that everything is properly prepared. Libertus, husband, you will mix the wine while Junio and Kurso get the lamb out of the pit and carve it ready for serving to the guests. Don’t put on your nice clean toga till you’ve finished that — you don’t want it dirty when the people come. Just make sure that there is time to change.’ She turned to Maximus. ‘Well, don’t just stand there staring, come and eat your stew. It’s early bed for you. We’ll have to be up before the dawn to get all this done in time.’

She had not mentioned the missing slave again. I nodded to Junio, who had caught my eye. Gwellia was dealing with worry in her usual way, by keeping so busy that there was no time to think, but I needed someone to discuss things with.

I talked to Junio well into the night, mostly about Glypto and my fears for Minimus. ‘Don’t say this to the others,’ I said in a low voice, ‘but if the green man has red hair and is Silurian, it looks more likely than ever that the rebels are involved.’

He shook his head. ‘Not necessarily. Most Silurians are loyal citizens these days — those two slave-boys of Marcus’s are the proof of that. It’s only a few fanatics that keep mounting these attacks. And why should a rebel be concerned enough to send a message here, even if you really had been hurt?’

We argued in circles for an hour or more, but we made no progress with the mystery. Finally, I crept away and went to bed myself, reluctant to keep the little family awake. I did not want to spoil Amato’s naming day.

But I slept only fitfully — and when I did, I dreamt of Minimus.