THE SILK TREE

CHAPTER FOUR

‘How’s our capital, now, Nico?’ Marius asked as the coins were carefully counted.

‘Improving.’

‘Can we-’

‘No. Capital is blood – we don’t shed it unless we have to. It’s our way out of this stinking hole, but we need to build up more.’

‘Damn it all, when will that be?’

‘At this rate… perhaps a year or so, then-’

‘I don’t want to wait that fucking long!’

‘This is what we have to do, Marius.’

‘Take a chance on it, man! Where’s your courage?’

‘No!’

‘I say, yes!’

Nicander’s face tightened. ‘You’re entitled to half the assets, Marius. Do you want them now? Shall I put them in a bag?’

‘A plague on your money-grubbing ways, Greek.’

‘Patience is the hardest lesson in business.’

‘A pox on that, too.’

Rage suddenly clamped in. ‘You stupid bastard, Marius! Can’t you see? Do you think I want it to be like this? Let me tell you, not so long back you’d see me running my own incense business, seventy men taking my wages, a turnover of a hundred thousand solidi, a reputation in the city. Can you just try to think how it feels for me to be grubbing about in oranges and pomegranates at the beck and call of any pig with an obol or two? Can you?’

Marius’s face went dull red. Then with a crash, his fist slammed down.

‘Now you listen to me, you… you poor pissed-upon bastard! How do you think I’m taking it? A first-class Roman legionary, service in Syria and Dalmatia, there’s enemy bones out there because I’m good with a blade – now all I’m told to do is put the frights on some witless idiot on a barrow stall!’

He heaved a deep breath.

Both men slumped back in their chairs.

After a space Nicander said, ‘Look, I do appreciate what you’re doing. It’s hard on both of us…’

He picked up his accounts and opened the ledger. ‘This Nabatean Grotius,’ he said wearily, ‘I advanced him an amount to cover his lemon shipment and now he’s crying poverty and won’t return it. If you could go and persuade him to his obligation… or it’ll leave me embarrassed in the matter of the currants deal.’

Marius flung open the door. ‘M’friend, m’ friend!’

He rubbed his hands in delight as he sank into a chair with a wide grin.

‘You have the coin, then?’ Nicander asked, surprised as the legionary had only been away an hour or so.

‘Better’n that, Greek!’

‘Oh?’

‘Grotius. He begs to be released of his arrears.’

‘And…?’

‘I said we’d agree to it.’

Lost for words, Nicander blinked in confusion.

Marius continued enthusiastically, ‘In view o’ what he had to say.’

‘Which was, might I ask?’

‘Ha! What you didn’t know is that the fat toad is in with the Blues faction in a big way.’

‘And what’s that got to do with us?’

The brutal Roman circus of gladiators and Christian sacrifice had long since been overtaken in Byzantine popular entertainment by other offerings; now it was wild animal baiting and, above all, chariot racing between the Blues and Greens factions.

Marius retorted triumphantly, ‘In two days there’s a fix, and Grotius is on the inside!’

‘So?’

‘He says it’s certain, as only he’s in the know and he trusts we’ll look kindly on his position while we collect our winnings.’

‘Do I hear you – you’re saying we should risk our precious capital – on a bet?’

‘Right enough. I can tell you on the quiet, he’s staking his wife and two daughters to slavery on it.’

‘No reason for us to be demented as well! Now look, Marius, betting is the business of fools. Can’t you see he’s throwing out an excuse so you leave him alone?’

‘This is our chance to make a hill o’ cash! Greens have had a good run with Priscus, their crack driver, they’re calling odds of sevens at least on a Blues win. We put-’

‘No!’

‘I say we go for it!’ Marius growled. ‘Anything which sees us on top o’ this world instead of-’

‘You fool!’ Nicander said. ‘We’ve not one shred of proof that there’s such a fix being planned. You’d throw our money at a bunch of losers and-’

‘Look, he’ll take us to see Nepos, the Blues driver. Introduce us. You can ask him yourself!’

Grotius met them outside the Blues faction clubhouse. ‘So pleased you could come, gentlemen,’ he said with an oily charm. ‘It might be better to sport these favours?’ He handed a blue cloth spray to each of them to pin on their tunics. His own had an ostentatious silver clasp, Nicander noted, already regretting his agreement to humour Marius.

‘My party,’ Grotius told the heavyweight pair at the door and they proceeded into the noisy interior.

Seeing the marble panelling, ornate classical statues and the occasional flash of a senatorial toga, Nicander suspected that Grotius was a man living to the limits of his means.

He also knew the factions were more than simple supporters. Enormous sums were granted to them by the Prefect to manage the public shows. In Rome there had been four factions but now the Blues and Greens had it all between them. They played to the masses and ran an operation that included top charioteers and circus spectaculars.

They could effortlessly whip up the mob with professional cheerleaders and gangs and were therefore a formidable political force, even having the power to address the emperor directly in their own interest.

Nicander trod carefully around the carousing groups as they followed the corpulent merchant. Female cries that left no doubt as to the activity within came from behind closed doors. A stream of slaves bearing exotic sweetmeats and jugs of wine jostled past. Occasionally, well-dressed patrons nodded familiarly at Grotius then looked curiously at his guests.

At the end of the long passage Grotius knocked firmly at a door.

‘Who the fuck’s that?’ came a deep voice from inside. ‘I’m tired. Go away.’

‘Ah, Nepos, old friend. It’s Grotius and I’ve a pair of your greatest fans who beg to meet you.’

‘Oh? Well send ’em in if you have to, then.’

Rush dips guttered as they entered and a rich stink of horses lay on the air. The charioteer reclined on a leather bench. Two women were at work on his oiled back.

‘This is Nepos, gentlemen, the supreme chariot driver of the age!’

He rolled over to face them. Impressively big, with muscular thews and a deep chest, he had the dark of the Thracians. His hair was a riot of black curls in the old Roman style and he sported a pugnacious beard.

Nicander felt his presence overbearing. ‘Good sir, we’re here to express our best wishes for your contest with the Greens.’

Cruel eyes took him in. ‘You’ve got money on me, then?’

‘O’ course, Mr Nepos,’ Marius came in quickly. ‘Knowing you’ll win, like.’

‘What do you mean?’ The charioteer snapped, sitting up suddenly.

‘That your loyal Blues have taken precautions to-’

‘Get out!’ Nepos snarled at the two masseurs.

‘Now, what-’

‘These are some of my closest friends,’ Grotius said, grovelling. ‘It behoves us to share our good fortune.’

‘They know…?’ He sprang lithely over and seized him by his tunic, drawing his face close. ‘How many others have you blabbed to, you Tyrian bird-brain?’

‘None but these, Master Driver, truly! And I can say they’re in great admiration that it’s your own cunning that came up with this winning stroke against those arrogant Greens.’

Nepos let his hands drop. ‘So they should be, runt.’

‘I would be so gratified if you’d show them something of our little surprise.’

The big chariot driver hesitated, then gave a wicked grin. ‘Follow me.’

Below the clubhouse were the workshops and Nepos stopped at the one with two lounging guards. ‘Just remember,’ he muttered darkly, ‘the Greens have got it coming!’

Inside were workbenches and timber racks, but in the centre was the sleek and oddly large bulk of a racing chariot. Not much more than a platform on wheels with a raised breast-rail and side panels, it was clearly designed for victory. In weight it was pared down to the very limits of prudence: wheel spokes nothing but spindles, iron fittings like filigree and a single supporting beam fore and aft. On the side was emblazoned a large blue escutcheon. The whole gave an impression of arrogance and speed.

Nepos swaggered over to it and lightly stepped aboard, cutting a magnificent figure as he looked down on them. He dropped to a racing crouch, one hand stretched to the ‘reins’, the other furiously cracking an imaginary whip, his lips curled in a contemptuous sneer. ‘It’s the last lap, the Greens are coming up on the outside. I sees ’em, gets ready. They’re coming… we make at each other. Priscus doesn’t give way, the prick. But next time he gets it – like this!’

There was no giveaway motion that Nicander could see but with a shocking clatter a small wooden pole suddenly shot out from the side of the chariot, ending yards away.

‘See?’ It didn’t take much imagination to conceive of its effect on an adjacent chariot, thrust into flimsy wheel spokes at speed.

Nepos leapt to the ground and bent under the platform to replace the device. ‘That’s all it is!’

The concealed pole was held by a simple leather spring which was restrained by a small peg protruding up through the platform. The driver had only to tread on the peg to set it off. And with both of his hands in sight working reins and whip there could be no accusations of interference.

‘Ingenious!’ Grotius chuckled. ‘And will see us rich as Croesus!’

Nicander and Marius returned to their tenement.

‘I told you it was a certainty, didn’t I!’ Marius crowed. ‘Worth staking all of, say, ten golden solidi, don’t you think, Nico?’

Nicander didn’t reply but went straight to his accounts.

‘Did you hear me, Greek? At least ten – why not fifteen?’

Nicander flipped the ledger firmly shut and looked away.

‘So just five, then.’

There was no response. ‘Come on, that’s not so much – is it? This is our big chance! Have we ever seen anything like it since we came to this pox-ridden place? We can’t let it go without-’

‘You know nothing of finance, do you? Five solidi – how much do you think this can yield on just a single voyage in olive oil? No? I’ll tell you. It returns as eight. A profit of three on five.’

Marius stared back obstinately.

‘But this is a four month turnaround voyage. And danger of pirates and tempest.’ His eyes held Marius’s with a sudden intensity. ‘Three solidi! Enough, perhaps, to keep us in meat for six months. And then back to that woman’s stinking fish. But let’s say we take our five solidi to the races at a solid sevens. Thirty-five solidi! Think of it – put on a Cyrenaican grain venture we’d be talking near fifty! Reinvested in another, and one on the side in marble and we’d be looking to moving out of this… this situation in a year.’

‘Well, let’s do it! The five on Blues to win!’

Nicander didn’t answer, his gaze unseeing.

‘Why not?’ Marius blazed.

Nicander reached for his slate, his hand flying as he made calculations.

‘This is why not,’ he said, holding it up.

‘What’s that to me?’

‘If instead we settle all we can rake together on a certain sevens, we stand to make six… hundred… and… seventy… gold ones! We clear out of here, set up on The Mese and get our start! The world ours for the taking, Marius! With that kind of cash we get respect, investment capital and decent living all in one hit! We’d be on our way!’

Marius blinked, startled at what seemed so out of character in his friend. ‘Yes, but don’t you think-’

‘Who’s holding back now! Courage, brother!’

‘That’s all our savings, and most of our purse too. What if something goes wrong?’

‘We saw with our own eyes what’s in plan, and the Blues’ greatest man to do it. How can it fail?’

‘I…’ rumbled the big legionary awkwardly.

‘Look, remember what Grotius said at the end. We don’t place the bet until they’re at the starting line. Gives us the chance to wait for the secret signal from Nepos that’ll tell us the Greens haven’t rumbled what’s going on. Nothing to risk now, is there?’

‘What if-’

‘You’ve objection to the high life? Slaves, fine wine, Palmyran dancing girls at dinner?’

‘But-’

Nicander slapped his hands down on the table. ‘An end to it! All or nothing – what’s it to be…?’