The Boat of Fate (38 page)
At least there was no fault to find with the defences of Verulam. It was by far the smartest, best-cared-for city I had yet seen; and its massive walls and gates were heavily manned. I stayed overnight at the home of a curiale, Pacatianus. There was, he told me, no lack of money in the Colonia; in fact an extensive building programme was currently in progress. I would have stayed longer had I been able, savouring the unexpected air of confidence and prosperity, but there was no time. The situation in the west demanded intervention; I rode by long stages to Corinium.
The problem was with the laeti, Germanic farmers who had been established round Glevum and Corinium and along the banks of the Sabrina. In theory such settlements acted as buffer zones in the absence of regular troops. A similar scheme was operating in the north. There it seemed to be functioning successfully, but in Prima it had already bred a state bordering on civil war. A series of ugly incidents had taken place; crops had been burned, a man or two killed, and tempers were running high on both sides. I arrived myself in a scarcely simulated rage. The Province had troubles enough without such pointless bickering.
For sprawling, ill-kept immensity, Corinium was second only to Augusta. I took up my quarters in the town and requested, through the office of the Praeses, a full meeting of the Curia. It was called for the following week; and I sent messengers to the scattered German settlements instructing them to send delegates to state their case. In the event, none arrived; I was forced to speak to the Curia in their absence. I had spent the intervening time making enquiries of my own. It seemed most of the trouble had been started by the British. There was widespread resentment at the requisitioning of land for foreigners, while for their part the laeti were obviously prepared to defend their newly founded homesteads with their lives. I told the curiales, sharply enough, that the blame lay at their own door; I stressed the value of laeti in the overall scheme of defence, and ended with a dire though unenforceable threat to garrison the place with Burgundians. That at least was effective. A motion was passed pledging me the support of Corinium. I suggested in my turn that the town’s resources be employed in the creation of a force of limitanei similar to the one I had established in the east. If the local young bloods needed to work off excess energy they would be better employed slashing at practice stakes than barbarian settlers, whose only fault was probably their lack of Latin.
It was harder to win the confidence of the laeti. I managed finally to convene a tribal council on neutral ground a few miles from Corinium. I attended in full-dress uniform, absurd though I felt the whole thing to be, with half a dozen burly Celts as bodyguard. At least it made a colourful display; the Germans, big, slow-moving men for the most part, seemed suitably impressed. They were diffident and awkward at first; eventually they realised they had a genuine chance to air their grievances. The speeches went on for a day and a half before I pronounced judgement. ‘This armband I wear,’ I said--the golden torque had once more worked its charm--‘was given me by a chieftain of your own people, a great prince in his land. So you know that no stranger speaks to you, but one very like yourselves. By it I swear that your interests shall be my interests, your wrongs my wrongs. Harm done to you will be as harm to me. In return you must promise to keep the Law, and not take up arms against your neighbours. For the crops that have been destroyed, you will be given seed corn in the time of planting. I cannot restore your lost ones to you, but their blood money will be paid in gold. By this means their ghosts will be placated, and will not trouble you at night. May the Vanir guard your fields,’ I finished haltingly, ‘and the Aesir look on you with kindness.’
I was reprimanded, of course, by the office of the Praeses for my high-handedness; but as I pointed out, at least the appearance of peace had been restored. The reparations were duly made; it seemed the threat of Burgundians carried some weight, even with a Roman governor.
Summer was once more drawing to an end. Mornings and evenings were misty, the air filled with a faint pervasive tang like the burning of dead leaves. I would have liked to rest, but I still seemed to be working against time. To the west, ramshackle and undefended, lay Glevum, fronting the Sabrina and the mountains of the Silures. I spent some time in the town, trying to bring its inhabitants to an understanding of their danger. I made little headway. The quinquennales were away, I was informed; what remained of the Town Senate was hopelessly apathetic. Regular troops seemed the only answer. There were none to be had. I considered the possibility of bringing Germans down from Deva. In the end I dismissed the idea. Neither the Duke nor Hnaufridus could be expected to tolerate any further drain on their garrisons. We had reached our limit.
Once more, circumstances rendered me helpless. Round me lay a rich countryside. Sheep grazed the downs and rolling hills; wheatfields lay ripe and golden in the sun, villas nestled against the sheltered slopes. To all this, Glevum was the gateway. But Glevum wouldn’t fight.
I retired to Corinium. At least its walls were in good repair. I saw to the raising and training of the garrison. Day after day the place rang with the clash and rattle of practice weapons, the measured tramp of feet. It looked, and sounded, impressive. I wrote to Tammonius again, begging javelins and swords. If he couldn’t send me troops, at least he could open his armouries. A few weapons and breastplates finally arrived; barely enough to equip one man in three, but better than nothing. Shortly afterwards I held a parade of the new-fledged soldiery. The curiales of the town were delighted; but the occasion served, if anything, to increase my gloom. I had already seen how the Scoti fought. It would take more to stop them than pennants and gaudy cloaks. I dictated a full report on my activities, marking it for the personal attention of Stilicho, and detailed a man to ride with it to Augusta on the first stage of its long journey. Maybe it arrived, maybe not. Either way it made no difference to Britannia. I was asking Mediolanum for a Legion. It was a joke in bad taste.
Valerius rejoined me in December, armed with a massive screed covering every aspect of his work in Camulodunum. He told me the Saxon Shore was for the moment quiet. I wondered, wearily, from which direction the next inundation would come.
For the present there was nothing more I could do. In not much over a year I had ridden almost the entire circuit of the Province; and I was deadly tired. I decided to winter at Corinium. At least the town still possessed a few civilised amenities. A letter from Isca of the Dumnonii, requesting an authority to raise a regiment of its own, I passed to the office of Hnaufridus. Maybe with the spring I would travel into the far south-west, but not before.
The first snow fell, muffling the rutted streets, mantling the leaning, steep-gabled houses with white. Christmas came and passed; I shivered in church with the rest, celebrating the Birth of the Lord. The New Year saw us in the field again. Raiding parties poured in from the coast; every day brought some fresh news of disaster, while the trickle of refugees flowing into Corinium thickened to a stream. It was Deva all over again; except that we were numerically too weak to mount anything like an offensive. We sallied cautiously, keeping the walls at our backs, to engage such of the pirates as came within reach; but our efforts were little more than a gesture. The enemy learned to give the garrison a wide berth; elsewhere, along the coast and southward to Aquae Sulis, they burned and harried with impunity.
Spring once more brought a lessening of activity. Rumour had it the paramount King of Hivernia was preparing a massive onslaught, and had withdrawn his men. I had no means of checking the report, but at least the lull was a welcome breathing space.
The new season also brought an unexpected letter. I opened it curiously when it was sent in to me. It was couched in stiffly formal terms; it invited me to Censorina, a villa some ten miles north-east of the town, to a dinner to be given in honour of C. Sergius Paullus, Palatine Praefect and Commander of the West.
I didn’t care much for the tone of the address. They would be naming me Count of Britain next. Circumstances might have forced me to make decisions that properly belonged to a higher authority, but I had no interest in claims that would excite the immediate unwelcome curiosity of the Emperor. I made discreet enquiries, through the offices of the ever-resourceful Valerius. Censorinus, the owner of the property, was apparently one of the wealthiest Britons in Prima, with business interests as far afield as Belgica and southern Gaul. What he could want with me I had no idea, but all considered it seemed best to attend. I delivered my acceptance, and set out some days later to ride the few miles to the house.
Valerius attended me. The sun shone from a deep, clear sky; the trees of the many coppices were hazed with fresh green, but the wind was still sharp-edged. It was midday before we discarded our cloaks; shortly afterwards we came in sight of our destination, and both reined.
As I have said, the area round Corinium was dotted with wealthy villas, but Censorina was the biggest I had seen. From the trackway we were following the land sloped up gently to a curved and wooded ridge. In the tongue-shaped valley thus formed lay a great rectangular building. The nearest wall was pierced by an imposing entrance arch of stone; through it I glimpsed lawns and gravelled walks. Over the walls rose neat lines of red-tiled roofs; beyond again, crowning an eminence a few feet above the rest of the complex, were the columns and pediment of a graceful little temple. The whole place breathed an air of order, prosperity and peace.
Valerius stared at me and shrugged. I touched heels to my horse; a few minutes later we rode, harness jingling, beneath the gateway, dismounted in the wide courtyard beyond. We were met by a slave in a tunic of crisp white linen. He greeted us courteously in good Latin, welcoming us on behalf of his master. The Domina, he said, had ordered the bath-houses prepared; everything was ready, if we would be good enough to follow him.
A colonnaded walk stretched round three sides of the place. I followed the guide, nodding absently at his murmured comments on the weather and the state of the roads. Wealthy, Censorinus obviously was; his establishment reflected a level of taste and elegance I hadn’t so far seen in Britannia. We were offered, to my surprise, a choice of refreshment; for in addition to the normal suite the house possessed a Spartan plunge. Valerius opted enthusiastically to try the process; I settled for the more sedate arrangements to which I was accustomed.
The bath-house was neat and clean, its floors decorated with mosaics of doves and leaves. I was divested of my weapons and clothes, spent an hour stewing in the hotroom before submitting myself to the attentions of a masseur. It was curious to sit chin-deep in scalding water and hear birds singing in the nearby woods. It seemed already the place was throwing a spell on me, a pervasive charm of peace.
My tunic, as I had expected, was returned pressed and warmed. Valerius, pink-cheeked and healthy-looking after his exertions, was waiting for me in an anteroom. A slave appeared, bowing, to conduct us to the presence of our host. We followed him on along the colonnade. Early-evening sunlight lay richly on the lawns. Doves called from the trees; from closer at hand came the feral yell of a peacock.
The triclinium in which we found ourselves was in keeping with the rest of the house: a wide, low room, its walls decorated with elegantly painted plaster. A mosaic, with figures of the Seasons executed in the same cheerful Provincial style, occupied most of the floor; beyond, couches and chairs were grouped round a massive inlaid table. White-robed slaves stood about unobtrusively; several lamps were already burning, their warm glow competing with the last of the sunlight from the door.
The company, small as it was, was already seated. Censorinus rose to greet us. I saw a man of above-average height, but so slimly and delicately made that at first his tallness wasn’t apparent. Thinning sandy hair combed flat across his scalp accentuated rather than concealed the long line of his skull. His face was equally smooth, the skin drawn tight across the cheekbones. His eyes, cold and indefinite-coloured, never seemed fully to meet mine; his voice was cultured and flat, with a trace of sibilance. ‘Allow me to present,’ he said, ‘a business associate of mine, the Senator Gnaeus Gratianus; and my wife, the Domina Crearwy. The Palatine Praefect Caius Sergius Paullus.’ Then, directly to me, ‘You are most welcome, Praefect. I’ve been looking forward to our meeting. I hope our people have been looking after you satisfactorily?’
I murmured something appropriate. My eyes were on the mistress of the house.
She sat, correctly, on a carved, high-backed chair. Beside her was a slave, a piquant, wild-faced little thing with long dark hair reaching to her waist. The Domina herself was tall, I guessed; as tall as or taller than her husband. She wore a light blue robe, gathered at the shoulder by a complex golden clasp. Her hair, almost equally long, glowed softly, the colour of rich corn. She wore it loose, restrained by a simple fillet. Her face, neither young nor old, was long in jaw and nose like the muzzle of a cat, yet delicate, with a humour that quirked the corners of the firm mouth, and eyes as blue and vivid as the dress. They met mine and locked, moved away and returned; and it seemed for a confusing moment I was back in the house of Paeonius, seeing the heads of Gods loom from the dark. Calm heads, wide-eyed and inscrutable; heads of Pharaohs and their Queens, women who were cats and tigers that were men. In each a Line, discovered over and over in the stone, that is immortal.
Beside me Valerius had already disposed himself on the nearest of the couches. I sat, clumsily. I turned my attention briefly to the other guest, a balding, heavy-jowled man in a tunic of scarlet. He was silent. He was to remain silent throughout the meal; as far as I can remember, he never spoke a word. But his eyes, liquid and dark as the eyes of Censorinus were pale, watched incessantly.