A Roman Ransom (16 page)

I was anxious to question Myrna as soon as possible.

I got my chance to talk to Marcus about it a little later. He came to see me – dressed for dinner now – and still with the medicus a step or two behind.

He seemed depressed and sober. ‘Porphyllia told me that you weren’t asleep. I’ve come to tell you that we’ve put the ransom money out. The page took it, left it where they said and then went on to Glevum. I don’t know if they’ve picked it up yet, but I assume they have. I sent the oil-seller out a little afterwards, and told him that if he sees anybody in the lane he is to send me word. I didn’t tell him why, of course – the fewer people in the area who know that I’ve agreed to pay the kidnappers, the better, or we shall have this kind of thing again. But there’s been no word. I’m sure these villains are far too clever to be conspicuous. In the morning, when it’s light and my page comes back again, I’ll send him to discover if the money’s gone.’

‘And Gwellia?’ I said.

‘I asked the oil-seller to call in and tell her not to come tonight, on the medicus’s orders, because you had to rest.’ He caught my glance. ‘I had to tell her something – I did not want her to worry unnecessarily, and I couldn’t tell the oil man about the ransom note. So,’ he forced a joyless smile, ‘if you have everything you need, I think that’s all we can do tonight.’

I assured him that I was entirely comfortable. It was true – I am not accustomed to such luxury.

He nodded. ‘You are looking more like your usual self. No doubt the draught the doctor left for you has helped.’

‘You did take all of it?’ the doctor asked. ‘The second time?’

That was a tricky question. ‘Every drop has gone,’ I answered truthfully, and saw the doctor’s small, triumphant smile.

‘Then we will say goodnight,’ my patron said. ‘The kitchens have some soup for Junio and there is some hydromel for you. I must go to dinner and attend my guests – though I don’t feel much like eating anything. However, the chief priest of Jupiter can’t be made to wait. He is staying at the villa overnight again, and will conduct the reconsecration ceremony for my son at dawn.’ The chief priest has his own house in the temple court and has public duties almost every day, but when you are rich and powerful, it seems, even the gods must wait from time to time.

I seized my moment. ‘Speaking of the morning, Excellence, may I have a word with Myrna as soon as she arrives? There are several things I really want to ask her to explain. I think her testimony may be of vital help.’

Marcus nodded vaguely. ‘As you wish – though I don’t know what you hope to get from her. I’m sure that when I questioned her she told me everything she had to tell.’

‘With respect, Excellence,’ I said, ‘there may be things she doesn’t know she knows.’

‘Your pardon, Marcus Septimus.’ The medicus almost sounded humble for a change. ‘Allow me to make a small suggestion here. By all means allow him to interrogate the girl, but perhaps we two should be present when he questions her? You can ensure that she gives the same account, and I can keep a professional eye on poor Libertus here, and make sure that he does not exhaust himself.’

The ‘poor Libertus’ had a mocking tone, but my patron seemed oblivious of any irony. He nodded. ‘Anything you say, of course. Just as long as we get Julia safely back.’ He gestured to the doctor. ‘Come! We must cleanse our hands and make libations to the family gods before we eat. Libertus, we shall see you in the morning. After the bulla rituals, of course. The priest assures me that for the best results we should begin those at first light: we have consulted all the calendars and tomorrow is fortunately a propitious day. I wish that you were well enough to attend yourself. However, we shall see you afterwards and you can talk to Myrna then. In the meantime, try to get some sleep.’

I did not trust anything the doctor offered me, so I ignored his honey and water mix and had a sip or two of Junio’s soup instead. It had been an enormously long day for me, and I was tired after all the exertions of the questioning. In fact I was surprised to find how very weak I felt. I lay back on my luxurious pillows in the comfort of the bed, and – knowing that Junio was nearby on guard – permitted myself to close my eyes again.

My sleep was fitful, though, and full of dreams. Several times I jerked back into wakefulness, worrying over the problems of the day, and wishing that Gwellia was safely by my side. I felt as if I’d scarcely slept at all, but I must have done, because before I knew it the first light of morning had crept across the court and was throwing a soft glimmer in through the window bars.

At the same time I was aware of movement in the colonnade outside. I raised myself on my elbow and saw that the door was slightly open and two garden slaves were already busy on the path outside sweeping the leaves and dust away with brooms of bundled sticks.

I raised myself a little higher still. ‘Master?’ That was Junio, already up and moving, although I had not heard him stir from the sleeping mat which had been placed beside my bed. ‘You are awake, then? Do you wish to rise? They are making preparations for the bulla ritual.’

He pushed the door a little more ajar, and I could see that the court was full of industry – slaves with water jars were sprinkling drops to keep the dust at bay, others were scuttling about with coal and kindling wood, or carrying perfumed water to the master’s suite. Two maidservants were moving among the flower beds, selecting the most aromatic herbs and leaves.

‘They will put them on the altar to the household gods,’ Junio told me in a whisper. Though himself a Celt, he was raised in a Roman household as a slave and delights to tell me of the customs he saw then, as though I had never encountered them myself. ‘Now, I have brought an extra tunic and I’ve found a cloak – a warm one with a hood. Do you want me to help you into them? Even if you merely sit there on the bed, it will give you more authority when you interrogate the nurse.’

I nodded. I had thought the same – although when he came to offer me his arm, it took a surprising effort to stagger to my feet, and I had to sit down again quite heavily. By degrees, though, he slipped the tunic over me and strapped my sandals on. With the woollen cloak around me I felt warm and cosseted – but more like a man again; after a few moments I gave a sign and, with his help, I contrived to stand and take a few tottering steps towards the door.

I stood at the door of the sleeping room and felt the morning air against my face. It was cool and misty, but the freshness of the day – after the stuffy smokiness of the heated room – was as sweet as Junio’s hot mead had been. I gulped a few, intoxicating breaths.

The doors were open all round the colonnade – all the rooms in the court led off it, as they generally do in houses of this type – and from where I was standing I could see into the main block of the house, the central area where the atrium was and where the altar to the household gods was kept. The niche itself was hidden from my sight, but I could see that the chief priest and Marcus were already in the hall, together with the medicus and the senior slave of the house, who was holding out a phial (obviously the ashes from the temple yesterday) and preparing to pour the contents on to the altar. Servants were scurrying around with trays of sacrificial food, and lurking in the shadows was a man I recognised, with some surprise, as a silversmith whose Glevum workshop was not very far from mine.

‘He brought the bulla, then?’ I said to Junio.

‘A little earlier, while you were still asleep. He did well to get it here in time. Look, here is Marcellinus – with the handmaidens. And the servants have brought a burning brand to light the altar fire. The rituals are about to begin.’ He looked at me. ‘You’re not proposing to attend yourself?’

I shook my head. ‘Not this time. It will be a drawn-out affair if I am any judge. And anyway, without my toga, I am not dressed for it.’

I remembered the first ceremony very well – the naming day is a great occasion in a Roman child’s life. I was one of the invited guests, and thus had been privileged to bring a metal trinket (bought at some expense) to add to the chains of tinkling charms which are traditionally placed round the baby’s wrists and legs to entertain him as a kind of rattle during the ritual. Marcellinus was then only nine days old (as custom dictated boys should be), but he was very good and hardly cried at all – even when a strange man in incense-perfumed clothes (the high priest, who had been called in to officiate) took him from his father’s arms and muttered over him, before slipping the gold bulla round his neck and then seeking an extra benediction from the gods by passing the new-named infant through the sacrificial smoke.

There had been copious sacrifice, of course, and a sumptuous feast afterwards for all the witnesses, with baby and parents dressed in splendid robes throughout. This hurried substitute, without his mother present and with no important visitors, seemed a sad affair by comparison. Apart from the medicus and the silversmith, only the household slaves were there to witness the event – and not even all of them, since some still had duties to perform elsewhere.

I moved back to the shelter of the entrance to my room, where I was out of sight, before anybody glanced up and spotted me. In my state of health I did not welcome the idea of standing shivering in the atrium while lengthy prayers and blessings were tunelessly intoned – even if the chief priest of Jupiter himself was chanting them.

‘Bring me that stool from beside my bed,’ I said to Junio, ‘and I will wait here in the doorway for Myrna when she comes.’

But Myrna didn’t come. Most of the household servants were in the atrium, and it was very quiet in the garden now, except for the chanting from the atrium, and the pungent smell of burning sacrifice. Eventually it was Porphyllia who appeared, hurrying from the kitchens with a tray on which were a bowl of cold cooked apple and piece of bread, and a cup of the dreaded oxymel. This, evidently, had been prepared for me.

‘Would you like some breakfast, citizen? I was told to bring you some since you were clearly up. The doctor has said that you can have this today.’ She offered me the tray. ‘Go on,’ she urged, as I showed signs of pushing it away. ‘Marcellinus had some of the fruit earlier. It’s perfectly delicious . . . that is . . .’ She turned scarlet and clapped her fingers to her lips.

‘You tasted it yourself?’ I said.

She nodded ruefully. ‘Only a tiny little bit. I spilt it on the way. I know I shouldn’t – but it looks so good . . . Don’t be angry with me, citizen.’

‘On the contrary,’ I said. ‘If you recommend it, I will have it too. In fact, you have given me an idea. There are not many of your normal jobs to do at the moment, I think you said, while Julia isn’t here?’

She nodded doubtfully.

‘Then you can be my food-taster,’ I said. It was quite safe, of course. Once it was known that one of Julia’s slaves had been appointed to the task, it would be pointless to try to poison me. ‘Marcus promised I should have one, and you’ll do very well. I’ll ask him about it when he comes.’

‘Oh, citizen. Would you really? That’s wonderful.’ She was gazing at Junio with sparkling eyes. The poor lad would not thank me for employing her, I thought, but I did have other reasons of my own. Porphyllia was a natural chatterbox, and I was certain that I could learn a great deal about the house from her.

I sent her off, delighted. I shared the bowl of fruit with Junio, and – when she was safely out of sight – he slipped out and made a private oblation of the honeyed vinegar on the garden beds.

I became aware that the chanting from within the house had stopped, and the smell of charred herbs and feathers was beginning to disperse. The winter sun was well into the sky by now, and it must have been at least the second hour, but there was no sign of Myrna. Nor – for a long time – of anybody else.

At last Marcus, resplendent in his finest toga, and weighed down with jewels – obviously put on for the bulla rites – emerged into the courtyard with a worried air. Two of his house slaves were escorting him, but he brushed past them and came straight across to me. I struggled to my feet and would have knelt as usual to kiss his hand, if he had not motioned me to sit.

‘So the wet nurse hasn’t yet arrived,’ he said, by way of greeting. ‘I’ll send somebody to the house for her. You shall see her immediately she comes.’ He sounded grim. I would not care to be Myrna when she turned up, I thought. ‘You slept all right, I trust?’ he added.

I nodded awkwardly and pressed my lips against the outstretched hand. ‘I have been waiting for her here. The bulla ceremony went off without a hitch?’

He frowned, as if he had to recollect, and then said wearily. ‘There was one moment when we were alarmed: the chief priest almost dropped the flask of oil before the sacrifice. That would have been serious, of course – we should have had to start the rituals again – but fortunately he recovered and we avoided that.’ He was answering my question but there was something wrong. I could tell it by his face.

I tried to think of something bright and comforting to say. ‘So Marcellinus has a bulla round his neck again?’

A nod. ‘This time I hope it will remain there until he turns fourteen and is old enough to be a man!’ He was talking too quickly, and his tone was forced. I noticed he refused to meet my eyes.

‘Is there some new problem, Excellence?’ I ventured.

He turned and looked at me. He had been moving restlessly up and down the colonnade, but now he halted at my bedroom door. ‘Libertus, come inside. I need to talk to you.’

I was alarmed. Marcus wished to speak to me alone, and it was clearly something very serious. I feared the medicus had done his worst.

However, it was not an invitation that I could easily refuse. With Junio’s help I limped into the room again, while Marcus left his other servants just outside the door. That made me feel uneasy, but my patron made me more uneasy still by motioning me to sit down on the bed, while he sent Junio outside for the stool – a most unusual happening indeed. It is one thing for Marcus to squat down on a stool when the man he is talking to is ill; quite another when that man is dressed and seated like an equal. My patron is a stickler for proper protocol.