Tabula Rasa

Chapter 27

The hyssop had arrived not a moment too soon. A couple of the gate guards were pink-eyed and sniffing, and the watch captain’s voice had slid down several tones to an impressive growl. He too had heard the horn, and Ruso could tell from his expression that he knew what it meant. The guard had been put on alert, and remote work parties had been recalled, but so far nothing seemed to be happening. Certainly nothing that warranted Fabius putting in an appearance.

On the way back to the hospital Ruso reminded himself that there was a vast expanse of countryside out there within range of the horn, and the chances of anyone he knew being in the wrong part of it at the wrong moment were slim. Or they would have been, had the person not been Tilla.

Dodging an orderly carrying a stack of malodorous bedpans, he slipped into Pertinax’s room and closed the door behind him.

The prefect lay motionless, facing the wall. Holding his breath, Ruso stepped across to the bed and placed a hand lightly on the prefect’s ribs. He was reassured to feel a rise and fall, but it was not the steady rhythm of sleep. He bent closer and saw something glinting in the wrinkled skin around the man’s eyes. There was a faint damp patch on the pillow.

The food and drink brought in this morning had not been touched. Leaving the water jug and cup, he put the tray outside to be taken back to the kitchen. When he closed the door again, Pertinax must have thought he had gone. Otherwise there would never have been that low moan from the bed.

Ruso said, “Sorry if I woke you, sir.”

“I heard the horn.”

“There’s nothing much happening out there, sir.”

Without moving, Pertinax said, “You should have let me go. No bloody use to anyone now.”

Ruso had been expecting something like this. Pertinax had clung desperately to talk of his duties as if nothing had changed. Now the illusion had faded. He had begun the long struggle to adjust to a new reality.

“Are you in pain, sir?”

“No.”

“We can help if you are.”

“I can put up with a little pain, boy!”

“Can I take a look at the wound, sir?”

Ruso examined the stump. The swelling was no worse. He wondered how best to comfort a man who was no easier to console than the struggling cavalry stallion that had impaled itself on a fencing stake last month. The first vet who went to help had ended up in a hospital bed himself.

At least you could-allegedly-reason with a man. But the rational comfort offered by philosophy never seemed as useful in the face of real suffering as it did when you were reading about it at home after a good dinner. Reminding Pertinax that things could be worse was unlikely to help, and might well earn him a punch on the nose. In the end he said, “This is a very different challenge from anything you’ve faced before, sir.”

“Always thought I’d die with my boots on,” mumbled Pertinax. “Can’t even stand up to take a pee. And now the natives are playing up again.”

Trying to think of something encouraging, Ruso remembered the large newcomer in the office. “The clerk you asked for has arrived, sir. We all appreciate you putting in a word with the tribune.”

Pertinax grunted.

There was a soft knock on the door and a bald head appeared. “Visitors, sir,” it croaked.

Before the man could reply to Ruso’s “Who is it?” Pertinax growled, “Tell ’em to bugger off.”

The whisper of “The legate’s physician, sir” was not soft enough.

“I’m not bloody deaf,” Pertinax told him, “even if you are. I said, tell them to bugger off. All of them. Especially that one.”

The orderly shrank behind Ruso and croaked, “And your wife is waiting in the treatment room to speak to you, sir.”

“I’ll come and talk to them both,” Ruso promised, glad to hear that Tilla was safe from whatever was brewing outside, and wondering how she had managed to get past the gates. No doubt she believed that her reason for coming here was urgent enough to justify whatever disturbance she had caused, but he could not deal with civilian matters until he had finished work. He turned to the figure on the bed. “Sir, if you want anything, just ring the bell.”

Pertinax stretched out an arm. The bell tinkled. “I want my foot back,” he said.

The legate’s physician did not look pleased to be refused entry. Ruso considered offering a tactful excuse and then decided he was not going to take the blame for Pertinax’s decision, so he told the truth and was accused of being territorial.

“I wasn’t,” Ruso told him. “But I am now. I’m sorry you’ve had a wasted trip, but he’s my patient and my superior, and I promised him his wishes would be respected.”

Something about the physician’s nostrils seemed to tighten. “I shall have to report this to the legate.”

“Good idea,” said Ruso. “He and the prefect can fight it out between them.”

He passed several members of staff as he strode down the corridor to the treatment room. There was something unusually respectful in the way they acknowledged him. He squared his shoulders and lifted his head. It was, he decided, good for morale to be heard standing up for one’s patients.

Tilla’s news was indeed urgent, and deeply worrying. He understood now why the horn had been sounded, and his plans to ignore whatever she said until later had to be set aside. Putting his head round the office door, he asked, “Has anyone heard anything about a native boy being brought in?”

Gracilis’s eyes appeared above the wall of writing tablets. Nisus twisted round on his stool. Neither had heard anything. “I want to know straightaway if you do,” Ruso told them, aware that he had been asking the same sort of question about Candidus just now. Gracilis must be wondering what sort of outfit he had joined. “If anybody wants me, I’m going to see Fabius.”

As he was about to leave, Gracilis said, “We were sorry to hear the news from your wife, sir.”

“Yes,” said Ruso, surprised that Tilla had told these two strangers about Branan before she spoke to him. It showed just how desperate she was. “It’s very worrying.”