The Londinium File

by Gavin Chappell

  ‘There will be slaves down there, ducky?’ she said doubtfully. ‘They might see us, and report us! Have you ever been down in these tunnels?’

  ‘More than once,’ he told her. ‘They’re deserted for the most part. The slave quarters are to the south. They use the tunnels only when they have to, and we would be able to hear them coming long before we saw them. Or they saw us.’

  ‘Then let’s hurry,’ she said, ‘before the guards start searching for whoever started that fire. My fire arrow must have hit a wood store, going by the length of time it’s been burning, but it’s dimming down now…’

  They crossed the lawn, looking about themselves furtively. Lights were visible from the palace some distance away, but the buildings round the Golden Square showed no signs of life, except for one on the far left. They went round the small amphitheatre where Flaminius had once narrowly missed losing his life to a stray lion[10], and came to a pillared portico. The tunnel could be accessed from a trapdoor in the right hand corner, but they would have to enter the portico from further up and head in that direction.

  ‘You stay here,’ Flaminius told her as they reached the arch that led into the gardens. ‘I’ll see if I can find the hatch, then come back for you.’ As he hurried down a gravel path towards the corner, she crouched in the shadows of a laurel bush.

  He heard the tramp of booted feet from up ahead of him. Ducking into the cover of another laurel, he watched as a man in breastplate and greaves, wearing the red crested helmet of a Praetorian, marched down the path towards Rhoda’s hiding place.

  Flaminius waited until the man had passed, then stepped out silently. He wrapped his arm round the man’s neck and then, as the Praetorian began to struggle, calmly took his head between his hands and turned it first one way, then the next. There was a grisly clicking sound and at once the Praetorian was a dead weight in his arms.

  As he was lowering the corpse to the ground the gravel sprayed and he looked up to see Rhoda approaching at speed.

  ‘What are you doing?’ she hissed. ‘Who’s that?’

  ‘We didn’t have a chance to get acquainted.’ Flaminius hauled the corpse up by its armpits and dragged it to one side of the path. ‘He was heading in your direction.’

  ‘Yes,’ said Rhoda, as more booted feet could be heard from the direction of the portico, ‘and he wasn’t the only one. More are coming. We’ve got to get rid of him. If they find this body…’

  ‘Help me with him,’ Flaminius urged her. With an effort, they dragged the corpse through the bushes to the side of the canal. Flaminius unbuckled the sword belt and strapped it on. ‘The armour will weigh him down,’ he added, lowering the body gently into the waters. As they let go, it sank silently amidst the lily pads. Bubbles came up, but the dead Praetorian did not bob back into sight.

  ‘This way,’ whispered Flaminius.

  As booted feet crunched on the gravel elsewhere in the garden, he led Rhoda like a shadow in search of the tunnel entrance.

  — 11—

  The footsteps drew closer. The two fugitives raced silently through the shadow-hung colonnade. A door led into a small, dark room. Flaminius crouched down in the middle of it. There was no other way out.

  ‘Those guards are coming closer,’ hissed Rhoda. ‘What are you doing, sweetheart?’

  Flaminius was feeling around on the cold marble floor. At last his groping fingers found what he was searching for. A catch came free, a rectangle sprang up bringing with it cold dank air as of a tomb, and a well of blackness was revealed in the middle of the floor.

  ‘Down here,’ he said, gesturing at the darkness. ‘You go first.’

  Cursing, Rhoda hitched up the skirts of her tunic and lowered herself into the shaft, clinging onto the side as her feet scrabbled round for a foothold. The tramp of booted feet was very loud from the portico. Flaminius heard barked orders.

  ‘Where’s Lepidus?’ came a definite centurion’s growl. ‘He should have been patrolling this stretch.’

  ‘Maybe he went to help put out the fire,’ suggested another voice.

  ‘He had no such orders,’ growled the centurion. ‘When I find him, I’ll flay the skin off his back for dereliction…’

  Flaminius had heard enough. He followed Rhoda into the dark shaft, locating the rungs carved in the side and quietly pulling the hatch down behind him as he went. After a short descent, he collided with a soft yet firm form, which complained loudly.

  ‘Sssh,’ he told Rhoda, hanging from one rung. ‘They’ll hear us and come looking.’

  ‘You mean they know about the tunnels?’ Rhoda’s voice filtered up from the gloom.

  ‘Of course,’ he said. ‘They are not a secret. Leastways, not to those in the know. Hadrian built it as his underworld, like I told you. But from what I heard, they don’t have any clue that we’re here.’ He heard Rhoda start descending again. ‘Although what they’ll think if they find friend Lepidus at the bottom of that canal, I don’t know…’

  The shaft opened out as he descended, and he saw by a dim glimmer of light that they had reached the tunnel. Rhoda was already at the bottom of the shaft, and she stood there in silence, her eyes glittering as she looked up at him.

  ‘Where is that light coming from?’ she asked darkly as he joined her.

  Flaminius looked about. The tunnel led a long way eastward and westward, running under the portico to begin with, although it went much further across the Villa grounds.

  ‘These tunnels run for miles,’ he told her. ‘It’s like a subterranean city. Nobody knows the full extent of it, maybe not even the slaves who dug them. Maybe Hadrian does, maybe not even him. But in places they link with the world above. Apart from shafts like this one, there are other…’ He came to a halt.

  ‘You don’t really know,’ she said accusingly. ‘Do you?’

  ‘I told you, nobody does,’ he said. ‘In some places the tunnels are so wide you could drive a cart down them. Others are little more than crawlspaces… But it doesn’t matter. All we have to do is find a place where we won’t be troubled by slaves, and stay there until it’s time to meet Probus’ agent.’

  All the same, he was curious about the glimmer of light. It didn’t fit with anything he had heard about this tunnel. Although the source of the faint illumination lay in entirely the wrong direction for the Latin Library, he decided to investigate.

  ‘Come on,’ he said, and led Rhoda down the cold, murky tunnel.

  ‘Do the slaves blunder about in the darkness like this?’ she demanded, after stumbling and almost wrenching her foot.

  ‘They carry torches,’ said Flaminius. ‘But we can’t, or we’d draw attention to ourselves. Look. That light is getting a bit brighter…’

  He made his way forwards, with Rhoda hobbling along behind him. Slowly the sides of the tunnel and the overarching roof grew clearer in the ruddy yellow glow. It looked like it might be lantern light. But though Flaminius halted several times and listened, he heard no sign of approaching footsteps. Nor was the light moving, as it would be if it was a lantern carried by some errant slave. It remained in the same place, a long way ahead of them, down the tunnel. It was only their faltering approach that caused it to grow brighter, closer. Then it dimmed a little, but remained.

  Nervously, Flaminius approached, stepping as quietly as he could. Despite her sore ankle, Rhoda walked like in complete silence, so quiet Flaminius looked back more than once to make sure she was still there. She was as quiet as a predatory cat. This would hardly be the first time a thief like her would need to move undetected. Although from what she had said her thefts were the result of gulling doting old senators…

  Flaminius stopped short, hearing voices from ahead.

  ‘…some kind of alarm up top,’ a deep, masculine voice was saying. ‘A woodpile ablaze. They had a time of it, putting it out, those guards.’

  ‘His imperial majesty would not be happy if his wife went up in smoke,’ said a lighter, but still male, voice. ‘Or his gardens, though
he’d miss those the more.’

  ‘Enough of your seditious comments, friend,’ said the deeper voice. ‘You just keep an eye out. What news?’

  ‘Subject still under surveillance. Listened to a slave reciting Ovid’s Amores, spoke with a Praetorian tribune—couldn’t hear what was said, but subject seemed agitated. Then to bed.’

  ‘Ovid, eh? Naughty,’ came the first voice. ‘She’d better keep her mind off suchlike diversions. To bed—alone, I hope.’

  ‘Alone, but had trouble sleeping. Subject rose and paced about more than once. Now sleeping like a babe. Only one lantern still burning. Not much to see.’

  Flaminius drew closer. Round a slight bend in the tunnel he saw the source of the light—a narrow, horizontal opening in the right hand wall which led upwards at an angle. The gleam it shed was not as bright as it had seemed from round the corner. Only one lantern still burning, one of the voices had said…

  Rhoda drew up behind him, brushing against his flank as she too peered round the corner. She looked up at him. Flaminius motioned for her to keep back.

  Two burly men sat cross legged before the horizontal shaft, peering upwards, the dim gleam illuminating their faces. They wore green tunics, military belts and military boots, but they were not the overdressed, overly ceremonial Praetorians. These looked like tough, hard bitten legionaries. Centurions, probably—both were middle aged. One turned slightly and the light from the shaft flashed on a brooch he was wearing. A brooch in the form of a lance-head.

  Flaminius dodged back.

  Rhoda looked at him questioningly. He leaned over and whispered in her ear: ‘Imperial agents. They’ve got somebody under surveillance up there.’

  ‘Can we get round them?’ Rhoda whispered in return.

  Flaminius shook his head. ‘We’ll have to keep an eye on them.’

  ‘Who do you think they’re spying on?’

  Flaminius shrugged. ‘We must be right under the nymphaeum on one side of the Golden Square,’ he murmured. ‘I didn’t know there were sleeping quarters there, but it seems there are.’

  ‘And whoever is sleeping there,’ said Rhoda, ‘is being spied upon.’

  Flaminius peered round the corner again. There were a few too many spies in this Villa right at the moment.

  He felt a strange taste in his mouth, watching these Commissary men. He knew what surveillance duty was like—deadly dull, most of the time. Very occasionally, something happened—and that was worse. Little did these agents know that they were under surveillance themselves! Very lax. If they’d been his men, he would have insisted they surveyed the surrounding area regularly. Was this what the Commissary was coming to now that Probus had been ousted?

  He settled down to watch and wait.

  Sometime later—time was difficult to judge down in this bone chilling subterranean darkness—the bigger Commissary centurion stretched and yawned.

  ‘She’s asleep,’ he said. ‘Not up to any naughtiness. We’ll return to base and Primus and Tempus can take over in the morning.’

  He rose to his feet, followed by his companion, lit a lantern and started marching towards the corner where Flaminius stood. In that instant of full illumination, Flaminius saw a long, jagged scar running from the left eye of the first man, right down to his jawbone.

  With a stifled gasp, Rhoda seized his arm.

  ‘Quick,’ she hissed.

  Together they fled noiselessly down the dark tunnel. For the second time that night they ran from the pounding of booted feet.

  At last they came to the shaft.

  ‘Up here,’ panted Flaminius.

  Nimbly Rhoda swung herself into the shaft and began ascending the slippery stone rungs. Flaminius looked back as the footsteps grew louder. If there had been only one of the Commissary centurions, he might have served him as he had served Lepidus upstairs; serve them right for their negligence. But he didn’t want to leave a trail of corpses behind him, and besides, he could kill one maybe, but not two, not without a fight and that would draw unwanted attention. He followed Rhoda.

  Halfway, the tunnel below was flooded with light. Flaminius clung to one side, and peered back down. Were the Praetorians coming this way?

  The crowns of two heads bobbed by, the lantern glowing beside one; then they vanished up the tunnel, taking the lantern with them. As darkness fell, Flaminius looked up to see Rhoda’s anxious face.

  ‘They’ve gone,’ she whispered.

  The shaft magnified her words and they seemed to boom deafeningly in Flaminius’ ears. He gestured wildly at her to keep quiet, and cocked his head to listen. Surely the imperial agents had heard. But all that was audible was the distant thump of booted feet.

  He wondered where their base was. Did the Praetorians know about their presence here? If the new Chief was anything like Probus, probably not. But who had they been spying on?

  As if she could hear his thoughts, Rhoda said, ‘Who is sleeping in that chamber above?’

  Flaminius gestured to her to follow and descended the shaft again. At the bottom, he found the darkness almost impenetrable. Only the slightest gleam was visible from the far end of the passage. Now the imperial agents had gone, and the sleeping chamber above lay in darkness, this stretch of Hadrian’s underworld was as black as the reign of Chaos. But still there came a gleam.

  Together they stole down the tunnel, their passage easier now that they knew the ground better. They turned the corner and the horizontal shaft was ahead of them.

  Flaminius approached, Rhoda hanging back, peering up and down the tunnel for signs of anyone else, slave or imperial agent. But all was silent and as dark as the blackest midnight. For all she knew, it was midnight by now. She trotted to join Flaminius.

  ‘What do you see?’ she purred.

  He glanced up from where he sat, and gestured her to join him. She sat down uncomfortably and looked up the shaft.

  It ran a long way before it showed any kind of light. But at the far end was a chamber. Very little of it was visible, but a lantern could be seen burning. It must be an antechamber of the nymphaeum. She could hear a gurgling of some fountain, far off. But this was no kind of shrine. It was, as she had surmised, a sleeping chamber. In one corner stood a bed, hung round with veils, upon which lay a recumbent form. On the far side of the chamber was a solid looking door.

  Flaminius grinned at Rhoda. ‘I think I can guess who is kept confined in here,’ he said. ‘I recognise the place. It’s a building attached to the nymphaeum. Presumably intended for the priests of the shrine. But now it’s used for other purposes.’

  ‘Do you think that it is the empress in that bed?’ Rhoda asked.

  Flaminius shook his head. ‘Technically, not the empress,’ he said. ‘Sabina was never given that title officially. And now that she’s a prisoner, and will never see her imperial husband again, she can hardly be regarded as any kind of empress.’

  He looked up suddenly as the door swung open without a sound. A figure crept inside, closing the door silently behind it. At the same time the veils round the bed rustled.

  ‘I thought you would never get here,’ trilled a soft feminine voice. ‘Come and join me.’

  ‘I would have come sooner,’ drawled the newcomer in a man’s voice, ‘but I had to coordinate the fire fighting.’

  ‘Oh, you brave, foolish man,’ she said. ‘You have kept us safe in our beds. But you know that you should never come too soon. It is only recently that my spies have sought their own beds, thinking I was asleep.’

  The figure passed by the single lamp, and for an instant the face of a young man in Praetorian uniform appeared. He hovered nervously by the foot of the bed until the woman came to join him. She wore nothing but a diaphanous sleeping gown. Gently she took his hand.

  ‘Tribune Cotta,’ she said formally. ‘Join me in my bed. That is an imperial command.’

  ‘Madam,’ said the Praetorian tribune. ‘With respect, this is hardly fitting. I am your husband’s man. I am here to do your wishes,
of course, but….’

  ‘Then do my wishes,’ she said emphatically with a gusty sigh, slipping her hands round his armoured back and drawing him close. His lips found hers and they kissed long and lingeringly. It was the tribune who broke it off.

  ‘If I was found here,’ he gasped, though he was stripping his armour from him as he spoke.

  ‘You won’t be,’ she assured him. ‘You must go before daybreak, and return the keys to the locker. Tomorrow does not matter. Only now is of any significance. I have been so lonely... Come and share my loneliness with me!’

  She drew him back into the shadows of the bed and they vanished from sight.

  Chuckling, Flaminius peered upwards. Rhoda struck his elbow with the back of her hand. ‘Don’t watch!’ she told him as he looked inquiringly at him. ‘That’s none of your affair.’

  ‘Sabina’s affairs may be none of mine,’ he said, ‘but all intelligence is good intelligence, or hasn’t Probus told you that yet? This could be of immense importance.’

  ‘That a poor, lonely, imprisoned woman, whose husband neglects her, finds happiness in the arms of strapping young Praetorians?’ Rhoda said. ‘That’s between her and her husband, not that he should care. All that matters to the emperor is avoiding scandal. This has nothing to do with our mission, so keep your dirty little eyes to yourself. You don’t want to end up like Actaeon, do you?’

  ‘Actaeon spied upon Diana,’ Flaminius told her. ‘Diana is a virgin. Sabina most emphatically is not.’ He recalled his own brief encounter with her three years earlier. ‘Besides, I think I know the tribune. Knew him, anyway. Aulus Fabricius Cotta, the wretch. So this is what he’s stooping to, these days… Very well, this may be of no significance—although the fact that the Commissary is keeping her under surveillance could be important. In the meantime, we need to find somewhere we can hide until we can meet Minos in the Latin Library.’ He pointed back up the tunnel. ‘I suggest we go in this direction.’