Semper Fidelis

Chapter 25

Austalis’s face was the color of porridge, and a sheen of sweat lay on his skin.

Resting his fingers on a cold wrist with a pulse that was too weak and too fast, Ruso told him that Tilla was praying to the local gods on his behalf. The lad’s cadaverous attempt at a smile of thanks was interrupted by a hiccup. Ruso exchanged a glance with Pera, who had just entered the room. Hiccuping might sound trivial, but for a man in Austalis’s condition it was a bad sign.

Ruso observed him for a few minutes, checked the dressings, and promised to return in a couple of hours, not adding that there would still be enough light to perform the amputation. He had no idea whether anything would have changed in two hours. He was just putting off the decision, and he knew it. Geminus had shaken his confidence. How could he have been so wrong? Why had he listened to the recruits but not to the medics? Why had he believed every word he had been told?

Because he liked the recruits, and he didn’t like Geminus. Because Geminus and Dexter’s blame-the-natives attitude had annoyed him from the moment he’d arrived here. Because they would have said the same things about Tilla, and even if they were partly right, he would still have wanted to punch them.

“Sir?”

Ruso realized Pera had been talking to him since they set off down the corridor.

“Say that again. I wasn’t listening.”

“A word in private, sir?”

“Is it urgent? I’ve had enough words in private for one day.”

Pera conceded that it wasn’t, but his expression said something different.

Ruso owed the lad an apology anyway. “Come on,” he said, taking him by the arm and skirting past a squeaking trolley loaded with linen baskets into one of the unused rooms. He closed the door. The squeak faded into the distance. He said, “I’m listening now.”

“Sir, I apologize for that excuse about the man falling off the stretcher.”

“It wasn’t very convincing.”

“I’m usually much better at lying, sir.”

“Perhaps you’d like to tell me the truth now?”

“I’d rather try for a more convincing lie, sir.”

“I’ve had a conversation with Geminus,” Ruso said. “He’s explained some things I didn’t understand about the situation here.”

“Yes, sir.”

You should have listened to your staff. “So is there anything else you think I ought to know? Anything you haven’t just invented, that is.”

“If the centurion has explained everything, sir, then I have nothing to add.”

“Good,” said Ruso, noting the odd formality of the response. “That’s all right, then.”

“Yes, sir. Thank you, sir.”

“That’s all you want to say to me?”

For a moment he thought Pera was going to offer something new, but all that came out was another bland “Yes, sir.”

Ruso opened the door again. “You can go.”

Alone in the empty room, Ruso leaned back against the wall. Conscious of the distant bellowing of orders and the steady tramp of boots, he found himself wondering how many of the healthy recruits being drilled up and down the parade ground had been involved in the killing of Tadius. He closed his eyes, imagining the broken body lying in the street and the guilty men fleeing away into the night. Someone-the centurions, perhaps-had gathered Tadius up and carried him to the hospital, where Pera had recorded the details of the injuries straight away in the postmortem report.

Ruso frowned. He was not an investigator now. He never wanted to be one again. He just needed to satisfy himself about one thing, then he would be able to concentrate on Austalis.

Pera was halfway across the entrance hall when Ruso grabbed him by the shoulder. “Tadius,” murmured Ruso, in a voice so low even the statue of Aesculapius, benignly gazing out to welcome his new patients, would have struggled to hear. “What time was he brought in?”

Pera thought about it. “It was after the evening meal, sir, but it wasn’t dark. About the tenth hour? The days are very long at the moment.”

Ruso nodded. “It was still light enough for you to do a detailed postmortem report the same day.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Which ankle was the shackle mark on?”

“I can’t remember, sir.”

“But you can confirm that there was one.”

Pera’s hand rose to rub the back of his neck. “It’s hard to remember anything, really, sir.”

Ruso sighed. “Never mind.”

“Will you be joining me on ward round, sir?”

“No,” said Ruso, heading for the street. “But get a trumpet call out for me if there’s any change with Austalis. I need to go somewhere else.”